


Artemis Fowl: Key to Ethos

by FreakCityPrincess



Category: Artemis Fowl - Eoin Colfer
Genre: Action, Adventure, Chaos, F/M, Fantasy, Horror, Prisoners, journeying
Language: English
Status: In-Progress
Published: 2016-05-02
Updated: 2016-05-02
Packaged: 2018-06-05 22:39:44
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,110
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/6726286
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/FreakCityPrincess/pseuds/FreakCityPrincess
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>Taking place six years after the Eternity Code, Haven City is tangled in an unprecedented web of chaos. And the spotlight is once again on Artemis Fowl, the suspect, and incidentally also the help. Because there are secret keys to hidden worlds and the only chance at victory are a couple of calculated shots in the dark. Villains will cackle. Nightmares will talk. And a lot of things will go up in flames. This adventure is a game on a ticking clock...you hold all the losing cards.</p>
            </blockquote>





	Artemis Fowl: Key to Ethos

### Takes place six years after the Eternity Code

Stakeouts, in general, were not part of Holly's daily routine. She didn't usually have to spend hours in hidey-holes or treetops, or even disused lavatories like some of her more respectable colleagues had to, but her current mission had so far included many things besides that she wasn't particularly fond of. A shuttle ride with convicted felons because it was the only shuttle headed that way. Late arrival to a gang-fight between some rogue dwarves. Hurriedly performing the ritual. Getting lunch from the Mud Men's Subway. And now, finally, lying low atop an human five-star-hotel's roof.

And the best part? Foaly had been in her ear all along.

"...And then," he was whinnying, "She took the moisturizer away, said I needed to get a new one because this was expired–moisturizers don't expire! After I kept on refusing, she threatened to cut the wires on my monitors–my old monitors that had wires, and when I said no, you can't do that, she showed me the kitchen scissor! And that scissor is sharp, if you've never seen it. Honestly, Holly! Caballine's so full of drama–"

Holly groaned a very loud groan, hoping he got the point. He did. But he pointedly ignored said point.

"You are so lucky, you know that? You don't even need moisturizer. Skin is easier to look after than hooves. Skin blisters will hurt, granted, but blisters under your feet? Can you imagine that sort of pain?"

The elf sniffled. "Foaly, I just travelled across D'Arvitting Europe to track him down, and I swear if I miss this time because of your rumbling–"

Foaly snorted. "It's night. It's very, very late in the night. I don't have anyone to vent my sleepiness on..."

"You haven't been this annoying since your wedding night!"

"You can't blame me for that! I was nerve-wrecked. Imagine if Caballine's family had suddenly decided I was not worthy or something!"

Holly rubbed the bridge of her nose. "Please show up," she pleaded their suspect. "Please show up soon."

The cold English air felt air conditioned to breathe, but a lot pleasanter given the fact that it was all natural and winter was long past starting to fade. Holly didn't like stakeouts at all; but she did love the surface, and everything that came with it save for a certain species hated by most fairies. She loved the sun, the cool mud, the mild morning breeze and the crickets. Dolphins, cute and impossible to have straight conversations with. The nights. Several phases of moon and ignited stars on a dark blue or pitch black sky– it was really not fair that the people had been driven away from all of it. The Mud Men were barely capable of handling it. Green house gases. Everything exploding. If only they knew what it felt like, the claustrophobic depths of Haven City.

Their case was a major one. Perhaps the suspect was merely a suspect, but whether they had evidence or not, he had the potential to be a dangerous enemy. They had known that right from the beginning. It actually disappointed her a little. She had honestly dared to hope things would change...

"Holly, look down."

She looked down at once, triggering a shiver of alertedness up her spine. It wasn't difficult to locate what was down–what was difficult to locate was the target himself.

"Why is..." started Holly, always ready to whine to Foaly, but she trailed off.

_Oh no. Oh no, this is not going to be easy._

The crowd was huge. Easily two hundred odd regular hotel guests, add to that a sudden emergence of several camera crews and security personnel. She hadn't seen this before. It hadn't been there before. They'd all come out like moths attracted to a lamp on a gloomy day.

Grunting, Holly pushed herself down on her elbows and squinted. She was forced to blink several times. The paparazzi was blinding. Flashes of white and neon colours from everywhere in the excited crowd, exploding like toxic paint bombs. Foaly said something, but she drowned him out. Commander Root had sent her on a hunch, yes, but if this human was really behind it...

Bingo. Holly shielded a good half of her vision with an elbow and concentrated on the newly acquired target. In the very center of the chaos, the eye of the cyclone, was the subject of all the attention. A metallic-black Audi A6 with tinted glass and bulletproof windows. But it was closed. Nobody was getting out.

Then someone did, and Holly felt a feeling of dread and anticipation she hadn't felt in all of six years.

A huge man, shaven, in a formal suit-and-tie– bulked up with both the his sheer size and a very possible arsenal of weapons within his coat pockets. Most of the crowd immediately edged away. Holly wondered briefly how he had even fit into the driver's seat, but that senseless wondering was put to an abrupt halt when the manservant opened one of the rear doors.

Foaly said something over the comm, but all she heard was the thundering blood rush in her ears. She knew what it was. It was thrill. It was eager expectation. A part of her wished he'd turn out to be innocent, but a good three-quarters of her just hoped there'd be a problem.

Her desk job as a Major was getting boring. And it was damn well _about time._

At the rear door, a slim briefcase in hand, Artemis Fowl stepped out of the car with a look of complete irritation sewn into his features.

"...olly, are you getting this? Speak up! Are you...D'Arvit, are you apprehended? Is there a gun pointed to your head?"

Surprising herself, Holly hissed at him to keep quiet.

Fowl was greeted by hordes of people who were either admirers or muscle hired to hug him to death, and entire shoals of girls his age, but the bodyguard would simply not have it. Nobody dared question that. Not even the ones wearing seven layers of lip gloss. Artemis gave Butler a grateful nod and walked straight through the path cleared for him, as if he couldn't at all hear the silent, frightened noises of clicking cameras and scrawling on reporters' notepads. No, he just walked straight into the hotel with Butler at his heels, and it took five entire minutes for anyone left outside the doors to get over their fear and silence. Butler often had that effect on people.

It also took five whole minutes for Foaly to reach Holly, because she'd muted him on the comm.

"Hey! What was that for? I honestly thought you were in some kind of dangerous–"

Holly muted him again and let her eyes fixate on the spot Fowl had stood the longest in.

He had grown up, there was no doubt about it. He was no longer a fourteen year old, or anywhere near a teenager, he was actually grown up now. And yet...and yet he continued to pose a threat to the people, if he was actually the one behind the illegal shipments of goblin weaponry. Fowl, Julius had said. The case smelt of Fowl. And that's why she was here, on a mission nobody but herself, Foaly and Julius knew about. 

But he had still changed.

Artemis Fowl was what you'd call a billionaire with a purpose. Two years ago, the Mud Boy–Man, the elf corrected herself, had bought out a solar cell company and mixed his own ideas into the design. The result had been a hundred percent spike in efficiency, storage and an enormous price tag. Fowl hadn't stopped there. He'd come up with a mode of successfully transmitting excess energy across parts of the world with some complicated satellite things–Holly, as you may have realized, was not one for technical terms–and the world had been shocked. Fowl had subsequently won two Nobel prizes, three invitations to the White House and the cover of TIME Magazine. She would never admit it even to herself, but her heart had fluttered. Who cared if he was profit-motivated? He was actually doing something for the planet. Something truly honorable that saved the Earth from Mud Men's habits.

But now, of course, she was more than a little annoyed that he was attempting to stick his nose back in Fairy affairs.

Foaly somehow managed to override her headset and get in her ears again.

"Holly, what in Frond's name is wrong with you?" he demanded, voice sounding more real now than robotic. "You are not supposed to cut off connection like that. You might as well remove your helmet and throw it away, you know? What was that all about?"

His sudden input was enought to rudely summon her back to reality. Holly snapped, waking from her daze, before quickly remembering why exactly she was perched on the roof of a Mud Man dwelling. 

"Sorry," she said, not feeling very sorry. Her train of thoughts just a while back was already starting to catch up to her. "I should go in, right?"

"Go in, knock him out, bring him over to my interrogation room."

Holly frowned. "Well, one fairy isn't enough to apprehend Butler."

"No, but one Mesmer is." Foaly was obviously still irate about the muting. "If you can somehow look him in the eyes long enough."

Holly shook her head as the realization fully dawned on her. "I got this far with no actual _plan?"_

"No plan can outdo Butler," said the centaur a little apologetically. "I'm sorry, Holly, but you were also hired for your brains."

The elf cursed under her breath. She had really not expected something like this. "What does the room look like?"

"Penthouse suite," said Foaly, who probably called up a blueprint monitor while he was at it. "Two rooms, about the same size, very big. A lot of furniture you could hide behind, luckily, and as there's also the possibility that Fowl will get the room without the window, going through the window would mean hello Butler, bye bye dear life."

"How can I get to Fowl, then? Avoiding Butler of course."

There was a brief pause on the other end of the line. "The only window anywhere around Fowl, that wouldn't be bullet proof or titanium-locked, would be in the bathroom adjoining his room."

Holly almost snorted. Almost. "What if the big man decides to have that bathroom?"

"I checked," assured Foaly. "It's a very small window, just before the shower cubicle, barely enough for even you wiggle your way in. It _is_ bulletproof, but it doesn't have a titanium lock. This can go very straightforward if you mesmerize Fowl before he gets to call Butler. And seeing as you're now an entirely new species to him, he _is_ going to be very interested."

Holly's ears prickled. "Just what are you suggesting, centaur? That I take off my disguise?"

"It's a holo-projector, Holly, not a disguise. Up close he'll be able to tell that you're flickering," Foaly made a sound that sounded like chewing on a carrot. Her own stomach growled. Damned Subway. They had given her a kiddies sandwich and a Kylo Ren toy. Foaly continued unawares. "I mean, you tell him you're an elf and he's going to have at least twenty questions. He isn't going to call Butler straight away because he'll be interested in getting his answers."

Holly narrowed her eyes. "You and I are going to have a serious talk about planning a mission in future."

Foaly, she knew, hid a chuckle at that. "You don't like Tom Cruise-style cinematic break-ins?"

"I doubt even a human actor has broken in through a bathroom window."

"The bathroom isn't a problem," she could swear she heard Foaly smirk. "Didn't you notice already? Fowl is quite the specimen, even for a human."

Holly ignored the faint rush of colour creeping to her cheeks. "No, I didn't notice, Foaly. I think you've been watching too many Skylar Peat movies."

"In which the helpless but fiery damsel falls for the ruthless but very handsome enemy?"

"In which a centaur once annoyed an elf and ended up in a hospital bunk."

"Oh. That one."

"Yes, that one."

"I didn't like it very much."

"I do now. So stay quiet and speak when spoken to. Am I clear on that?"

Foaly gulped. Looking back now, really shouldn't have made that joke. "Yessir."

Holly pulled her visor down over her eyes. "Good. Now, Fowl, let's see if you have what it takes to be back at Public Enemy Number One."

•

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> You can find five chapters of this fic already posted on FF, but I do hope you leave me a review:)!


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